Grand Prairie man prepares for swim across Pacific

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Louis DeLuca/Staff Photographer

Ben Lecomte of Grand Prairie practices in the swimming treadmill at the Institute for Exercise and Environmental Medicine in Dallas. Lecomte is the first man to successfully swim across the Atlantic Ocean, and is planning a five-month journey to swim across the Pacific Ocean in coming months. He uses the swimming treadmill to train, because it mimics swimming in the open water.

Ben Lecomte has been drawn to water since his father taught him to swim as a 5-year-old.

“From that day on, I liked the ocean,” said Lecomte, 45, of Grand Prairie, who grew up in France and learned to swim in the Atlantic Ocean.

His fervor for water fueled a swim across the Atlantic Ocean in 1998. He’s now preparing to swim across the Pacific. He anticipates that the 5,500 nautical mile journey from Japan to San Francisco will take up to six months.

“That’s what makes me happy,” he said. “That fulfills me.”

Lecomte said he envisions swimming approximately eight hours a day as he did when he crossed the Atlantic. That should give him time to rest and to sleep and not feel too sore or tired from the day before, he said.

“I know I can swim one hour,” he said of his training and getting across the Atlantic. “That’s all I focus on. When I’m finished with that hour, I think about the next hour. I never thought about 3,000 miles or two months. I focus on what my brain can handle.”

He said he developed the strategy after consulting Dr. Edward Coyle, a University of Texas kinesiology and health-education professor, who runs the Human Performance Laboratory in Austin. Coyle recommended flexibility and that Lecomte listen to his body.

“You don’t know how your body will react,” Coyle told him. “It’s not only about you and what you can do, it’s always what the environment is throwing at you.”

To prepare, Lecomte spends up to six hours a day in a pool or at Joe Pool Lake. He uses a mask, snorkel and fins, eliminating the need to turn his head to take breaths. He occasionally completes a four-hour stationary swim against a steady current in a flume at Dallas’ Institute for Exercise and Environmental Medicine. It’s like a treadmill for swimmers.

In the ocean, he’ll be battling waves, currents, winds and storms. He has partnered with Ridgeline Entertainment’s Doug Stanley, the Emmy-winning producer of the Deadliest Catch, to chronicle the swim. The company plans to interface with Facebook so anyone with Internet can view the journey live.

A departure date hasn’t been set. Lecomte is planning for a 25-person support crew living on a 100-foot long boat. Supplies will include: food for the journey, satellite, film and broadcast equipment and a smaller rig boat to accompany him in the water. The journey will be broadcast 24/7.

Lecomte’s drive to train and his tenacity to make this journey a reality seem remarkable considering how difficult it was to swim 3,500 nautical miles in 73 days from Boston to France.

“It was hell every day,” Lecomte recalled of his Atlantic crossing. “You can never fully prepare for something you’ve never done. I was isolated. There was no comfort. I was doing the same thing over and over, while mentally and physically in pain.”

When he finished, his initial reaction was “never again.” Like a mountain climber who has reached the peak, then rested and reflected, Lecomte said the passion returned. He knew he wanted to swim across the Pacific Ocean, but he wasn’t sure how to make time with work, marriage and fatherhood.

As he approached his mid-40s, Lecomte said he began reflecting about life and how his father had died of cancer at age 49.

“For me to say, ‘maybe I’ll do that later,’ wasn’t the right approach,” he said. “You never know how long you have to live.”

He began to map out a trans-Pacific swim. He didn’t tell anyone initially, but he started training. He spent a year steadily increasing his weekly swim time to get back into great shape.

The inspiration for Lecomte’s Atlantic swim came from French rower Gerard d’Aboville, who crossed the Atlantic in 1980 in a heavy, 15-foot boat. Lecomte realized he could swim faster than d’Aboville was rowing.

“That planted the seed,” said Lecomte, who was a teen at the time. “I knew it was something I was going to pursue sometime in my life.”

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